Sarah Palin fails to lead on gay equality

By
Jonathan Capehart

Sarah Palin is getting some mileage out of retweeting a pro-don't ask, don't tell repeal message from Tammy Bruce. "I'm focused on economic issues, and you may have noticed I was being quiet about DADT because that's not our most pressing issue," the openly gay radio host tweeted Monday. "...But this hypocrisy is just truly too much. [Enough] already -- the more someone complains about the homos the more we should look under their bed."

So, I guess we're supposed to presume that Palin supports the repeal of the ban on gay men and lesbians from serving openly in the military. And I suppose by extension we should presume that she is down with gay equality. But it's easy to support something that has already happened and costs you little to speak out about -- even if it is in the form a retweet. DADT was repealed with 65 votes in the Senate on Dec. 22.

Palin had a chance to take a stand last November when her daughter Willow apparently unleashed the f-bomb (the one that rhymes with drag) on someone criticizing the premier of "Sarah Palin's Alaska" on Facebook. Bristol Palin seemed to step up with an apology of sorts. But the former governor, reality television star and self-proclaimed Mama Grizzly remained mute. This raises lots of questions about what constitutes accepted banter in the Palins' Wasilla manse.

Leadership is about staking out positions when it's difficult, not just when it's easy. Once again, it seems, Palin has taken the easy route.

By the logic of this writer and many of the comments, Gov. Palin would be supporting Obamacare because it's already passed law and it makes her look weak to complain about it. Please...Gov. Palin has always been a moderate on this issue. She played it down originally out of deference to John McCain. Furthermore, if any of her critics would read her books they'd see the last place she wants to the government is in the bedroom, furthermore, her greatest admiration has always been for those in uniform- gay or straight.

This "retweet" from Governor Palin should not surprise the well informed. Palin is a conservative in the Goldwater/Reagan tradition. Famously, Goldwater said "you don't have to be straight to shoot straight" and famously, Reagan was crucial to defeating the ballot to remove homosexuals from public schools in CA. People forget that Gov Palin vetoed attempts to rescind the acquired rights of same sex couples in Alaska. One does not have to believe that gay sex is "good" to do this. What one does have to believe is that what religious tradition, scripture and conviction regards as "sinful" should not necessarily be a "civil crime". Palin has grasped these distinctions and has got the theological/political balance right.

PLEASE, please, do not give this woman any more time and energy. She is an energy-suck. She is an energy vampire that sucks the air out of a room, the ideas from the brains of the people in that room, and there is no energy left to discuss real issues. Who cares what this one woman thinks? There are over 300 million citizens in this country - what about their opinions? Enough already with Sarah Palin.

"Fails to lead"? Sweet, straight, serene Sarah Palin is a nice, normal, happily married lady who happens to believe sexual proclivities are personal & private, not perpetually on parade, with her as drum majorette.

I guess to most of you anti-Palins out there no matter what she says you have to go the extra mile in twisting things to make her out as some bad lady. She shoots from the hip...so take it for what she says: there are more pressing issues. She has said she picks and chooses her fights and she has no dog in this fight. Period. She remained mute out of respect for John McCain and his battle with this issue.
I am sure she would weigh in on the issue if it ever comes down to criminalizing people in the church for calling it a sin.
Let me make this clear. Christians believe it is a sin like so many other sins that they should seek forgiveness and change and the only unforgiveable sin that will send anyone to Hell is unrepented sin. All Christians are forgiven sinners and that includes the sin of homosexuality which is to most Christians no different than being an alcoholic. An alcoholic cannot overcome his addiction to alcohol until he admits he is one and needs forgiveness and help in overcoming it. Just because he has a gene that says he has the tendency to become a alcoholic does not excuse him. Once he becomes an alcoholic he must confess and seek help in controlling the urge to drink. You cannot hate alcoholics nor homosexuals especially when we all have loved ones in these sins. We cannot force anyone to accept that they are an alcoholic that needs change nor can we force our loved ones to believe as we believe about any so called sin. ..and it is not the role of Government to dictate what someone should or should not do regarding these sins especially if they do not believe it is a sin...unless it hurts others or restricts someone from practicing their faith in calling what they believe to be a sin as such. We all love and accept our alcoholic family members and/or homosexual loved ones as they are. We simply cannot preach to someone repentance if they are never gonna believe they need repentance. That's like being friends with someone of another faith. You cannot change them nor preach to them your own faith because they have a right to believe as they want. It's called freedom....Sarah believes government should stay out of what someone believes or does not believe to be true for them.

Palin support any gay issue?. Give me a break. She was a pal of the Hawaii gov who vetoed even civil unions. She is everything bad that republicans (for the most part) are, and the only thing she accomplished for AmeriKKKa was to insure that the mental defect called McCain didn't become president. (witness his behavior on the senate floor about DADT.) Maybe we should cut him some slack and just send him home, given what the cong did to him in Nam.
Despite a few good repubs maybe are trying to help gays, this is all just another rove trick to pull some dems to the worst of American politics.

The repub base is the old south, filled with hateful people still relishing slavery and segregation, and who have a new victim - the gays. And palin - esp re her religion - Pentacostals -are some of the worst re bigotry in the name of God.
BTW - check out the hate group FRC. Spriggs and secretly gay Reker are baptist minsiters. One of them went to (anything but) Liberty university, to whom liberty means imposing southern baptist hatred on the whole USA.

And re FRC I've seen spriggs talk at the MD legislature. His hatred his hands shaking, his strident speech - the guy is an utter nut case, hatred you could cut with a sharp knife. And besides being a Baptist minister, he was an actor in christian plays in college. Almost certainly a self hating gay in the closet. throwing out his self hatred on others.

At least Reker outed himself via his being caught with his cutie renta-boy who he took to Europe to give him "Massages"

SJames6621.. you need to look in a mirror because you are filled with hatred and bigotry and are so narrow minded a sound reasonable thought cannot squeeze through your tiny little brain. You probably tape your mouth, wear a blindfold, and put your hands over your ears anytime you walk among a group of people because someone just may not be a DEMOCRAT....the horrors!
btw white Pentacostals were shunned and ridiculed because they dared to worship with blacks as it was a movement that started in a black church on Sousa Street. Anyone suspected of being a part of that movement were ousted from the Baptist, Methodist, etc. churches. So they formed their own churches. Today the movement is in most all churches including the Catholic Church. It is not bigotry. There are more black people worshipping along with Pentacostals than any other churches in America....so they are not bigots.
The only thing that Christians as a whole object to as far as homosexuality is concerned is the movement within the gay community that has an agenda to limit their own freedom of speech and religious belief in labeling homosexuality as a sin that needs to be repented of...for they care for the homosexuals...not hate them for the only sin that will send someone to Hell is unrepented sin and no Christian wants anyone to go to Hell.

SJames6621.. you need to look in a mirror because you are filled with hatred and bigotry and are so narrow minded a sound reasonable thought cannot squeeze through your tiny little brain. You probably tape your mouth, wear a blindfold, and put your hands over your ears anytime you walk among a group of people because someone just may not be a DEMOCRAT....the horrors!
btw white Pentacostals were shunned and ridiculed because they dared to worship with blacks as it was a movement that started in a black church on Sousa Street. Anyone suspected of being a part of that movement were ousted from the Baptist, Methodist, etc. churches. So they formed their own churches. Today the movement is in most all churches including the Catholic Church. It is not bigotry. There are more black people worshipping along with Pentacostals than any other churches in America....so they are not bigots.
The only thing that Christians as a whole object to as far as homosexuality is concerned is the movement within the gay community that has an agenda to limit their own freedom of speech and religious belief in labeling homosexuality as a sin that needs to be repented of...for they care for the homosexuals...not hate them for the only sin that will send someone to Hell is unrepented sin and no Christian wants anyone to go to Hell.

The sanctimonious half-governor and SheJesus of Wasilla finally realizes that catering to goobers is not sufficient to win at a national level. You need political substance or popularity with a larger base, the middle. She isn't going gain that substance, so she has to please the middle. Throwing in her support for gay rights in an era where it is slowly and surely becoming clear that the average American does not care about his neighbor's sexuality, and it is popular is a way to do it.

What she does not realize is that if she does go away from the religious wingnuts, she loses them.

Islamic terrorists and Christians the same??? Grow a brain! There is a difference between sticks and stones and words. Islamic extremist use sticks and stones and Christians use words...words in prayer, in preaching, etc. Not preaching hate but preaching or even "Praying the Gay away"..what's wrong with that if it is possible? Wish my precious cousin could have remained "celebate and continued to stay in church" rather than being talked into accepting that he could not change by a lover that knew full well he had full blown Aids and gave it to my handsome cousin who died an agonizing death less than two years from leaving his church. I don't know if he could have changed but I do blame some gays that are practically militant in their forcing their belief that they MUST BE ACCEPTED as they are and never need or could change. The cousin that died was led into church and the belief he could change by his Uncle, another cousin, that came out in the '80's and left his wife and 4 kids for 5 years, came back to his church, repented, remarried his former wife and has been living, he says, happily with his wife now for 20 years. He is the one that tried to talk my other cousin into believing he also could change. I don't know he could change, he told me it was hard for him. I only know I miss my cousin that died so young with so much to give ....I needed him ..I needed his love...and I loved him with all my heart.

HumanSimpleton: Let's do some thinking, okay? Of all the churches in America how many do you think preach or teach that they should bomb a wedding or blow up an abortion clinic or use any kind of violence against the things that they consider sin??? That would be none. Those that did that were crazy, messed up in the head people probably hearing voices. One infamous abortion clinic bombers was my sister's neighbor's son. His parents were indeed Christian but he was just some crazed guy that went off on his own in his thinking of how wrong abortion was. He would have been told how wrong his thinking was had he let someone in his parent's church know what he was thinking. Absolutely someone that took things he believed to the extreme and outside the true Christian faith.
No true Christian can hate anyone if they do then they are not Christian and no Christian would accept their talk of using any kind of violence.
All Christians are sinners that repented and turned from their sin because they believed what some other Christian "told" them by words spoken. No Christian is a Christian that can be forced to believe something. They are led into a Christian life by faith in the WORD SPOKEN...WORD PRAYED. THEY ARE WORD PEOPLE and the only battle they engage in is the warfare of prayer to God for change or preaching the word....WORDS NOT STONES THROWN.

ldfrmc: "Yawn"!...Ever hear a joke over and over and over again or see a magic trick that has been explained???..the mockery that Palin doesn't read is OVER already! The only way it worked in the first place is that it is told to people that cannot or don't read themselves. Guess you nor Couric read the 5 Op-Ed's published in major publications including the NYT prior to her becoming McCain's VP pick. You would have to have the publication to even submit your Op-Ed to it, wouldn't you? Hmm???Maybe you figure that Alaska is the only state office in America that doesn't subscribe to all the major publications or maybe you think Palin cancelled those subscriptions once she entered the office as Governor of Alaska. Like most teachers I know that push their own children to read Sarah's parents went to the extreme of putting the TV in an unheated part of the home to encourage his kids to read. Prior to the Couric interview her Dad stated in an interview that Sarah began reading the headlines of the newspaper at age five and he said that Sarah was an avid reader of everything. What you think he lied or guess you didn't see that interview. But I suppose the belief that she doesn't read comes from the Katie Couric interview in which Katie had a full days worth of footage and only used the most damaging of any clips to run ...and the fact that Katie knew that Sarah was told by her McCain handlers NOT TO BE SPECIFIC and had memorized a number of non-commital responses that had been written out for her to memorize...and yet Katie asked her about 20 times which publications she read...so she was so irritated that she answered.."Any of them...all of them"...and what in that answer don't you understand?...Sarah Palin reads...any of them ...all of them that have been in front of her all these years. Ask her now that she doesn't have to adhere to any McCain handler's control and she will tell you.
So get over it...Dummy! She reads.

Sarah Palin is not a leader--she figures out what the "average Joe" wants to hear and then takes that stand. Don't ask her to defend her position-she doesn't have the intellectual depth to do that so she hires speech writers and former newspaper men and attorneys to speak for her. It is so much easier to be a puppet. Fox lets her regurgitate what Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity or O'Reilly have already said and if she still doesn't understand the concept, they will answer questions for her or will give her the questions and answers in advance. No other Country would admire such a shallow person--she won't run for higher office because she can make more money fleecing those more ignorant than her. It is easier to re-tweet someone else's comments than to sit down and think out your own position and stand up for it if it is unpopular. It is easier to hire nannies for your special needs child than to take on the responsibility of being his Mother. The actress on Family Guy was correct: Sarah carries the baby like a sack of potatoes and yells if someone uses the R word--but her own actions are damaging him more than someone else saying the R word. Same with gays--Sarah can act like a Christian, but when everything is looked at, who can say that her constant lying is better than being gay.

Please ParkerRules stop with the words don't hurt nonsense. Hitler only killed two people, one of whom was himself. His words killed millions. I'm tired of hearing "no true Christian hates" when the evidence is quite to the contrary, both historically and currently. When the Christian communities form groups to fight against their other sins, the way they do against Gay sin, then maybe one could believe they don't hate Gay people.

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